1 In 4 Ocean County Hospital Beds Occupied By COVID Patients

OCEAN COUNTY, NJ — More than 1 out of every 4 hospital beds in Ocean County is occupied by a patient being treated for the coronavirus, according to the latest data.

Those numbers are highest at Monmouth Medical Center Southern Campus in Lakewood, where the latest federal data shows capacity at 100 percent and 10 percent of all beds filled with COVID-19 patients. Ocean Medical Center in Brick had the highest percentage of COVID-19 patients, with 43 percent of its beds occupied by COVID-19 patients and the hospital at 87 percent of its bed capacity.

The federal government released new hospital-level data and NPR, using analysis from the University of Minnesota's COVID-19 Hospitalization Tracking Project, built a tool that shows hospital-by-hospital information.

The data comes from the week of Dec. 4 to Dec. 11.

You can access the NPR tool here

At Ocean County hospitals, an average of 26 percent of all patients beds are currently being occupied by COVID-19 patients, according to the data.

While there is no clear threshold, NPR cites hospital experts saying that anything above 10 percent is concerning and anything above 20 percent represents "extreme stress" for a hospital.

As coronavirus cases have spiked in recent weeks, New Jersey health officials have urged residents to stay home, wear masks and observe social distancing in order to curb the spread of the virus and keep patients out of rapidly filling hospitals.

On Thursday, Gov. Phil Murphy announced that New Jersey had 3,582 people hospitalized, with 715 in intensive care and 480 on ventilators. The hospitalization number is well short of New Jersey’s peak of 8,200 during the spring, but Murphy has expressed fear that the state could hit those numbers again if residents don’t do enough to protect themselves.